Digital Currency Group's Barry Silbert is optimistic about bitcoin as an investment. "I think we’ve probably hit the bottom for the year. I actually put some money into bitcoin last week," he said at the Delivering Alpha Conference in New York on Wednesday. “As an asset class it is here to stay … I’m 100% confident a decentralized, non-fiat form of money is here to stay.” The price of bitcoin is currently trading at $7,380 Wednesday, down nearly 60 percent in value since it rose above $19,000 in mid-December. Circle's Jeremy Allaire, who also spoke at the same session on cryptocurrency, believes blockchain will serve as the foundation of new technology innovations. "This is a new infrastructure layer of the internet. It is going to replace what operating systems do," Allaire said. “It is the future of the internet ... This just isn’t about digital gold.

“Gold today has around $7 trillion outstanding. If you take, say, 5 to 10 percent — I’ll let everyone do the math — bitcoin has upside,” he explained on CNBC’s “Futures Now” on Thursday. Bitcoin currently has a market cap of $128 billion, according to Coindesk. If 10 percent of the gold trade were to shift into bitcoin, it would more than triple its market cap, by Gurbacs’ calculations. “Bitcoin is used as digital gold today. It’s a de-risk asset. Basically if someone wants to outlay systematic risk, then one would go to access gold or digital gold (bitcoin),” he added.